A file photo of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. The infamous couple has ties to Montgomery County and would reportedly hide out under the San Jacinto River Bridge and meet up with his Barrow relatives who live here. less

A file photo of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. The infamous couple has ties to Montgomery County and would reportedly hide out under the San Jacinto River Bridge and meet up with his Barrow relatives who live ... more

Photo: EXPRESS-NEWS FILE PHOTO

Photo: EXPRESS-NEWS FILE PHOTO

Image
1of/4

Caption

Close

Image 1 of 4

A file photo of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. The infamous couple has ties to Montgomery County and would reportedly hide out under the San Jacinto River Bridge and meet up with his Barrow relatives who live here. less

A file photo of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. The infamous couple has ties to Montgomery County and would reportedly hide out under the San Jacinto River Bridge and meet up with his Barrow relatives who live ... more

Even 80-plus years after their violent deaths, there's still something that fascinates people about Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow.

Bonnie and Clyde and their gang traveled the central US with their gang during the Depression era of the early 1930s, leaving a trail of robberies and murders in their path. Yet in the time of the "Public Enemy Era" they captured the attention of the American public.

In the decades that followed their death, public interest has resulted in movies, stage plays, an annual festival and documentaries on the infamous duo.

As a part of the upcoming Rising Stars and Legends of Texas celebration March 4-10, on March 6 at 7 p.m. Stage Right of Texas theater group presents a showing of the BBC documentary "The Real Bonnie & Clyde" which features access to gang memoirs, family archives and official records. The showing and presentation is a free event and takes place at the Crighton Theatre.

Prior to the showing of the documentary, Stage Right's Steven Wong and Ara Hollyday will present an information session offering little-known trivia and insights to separate fact from myth.

Wong and Hollyday are currently in development for a Stage Right documentary on Bonnie and Clyde.

Their work together started when they visited the Brenham theater group. This group put together a documentary about Dr. Brenham, the town's namesake to show at their theatre.

The pair thought this was a great idea for Conroe and they put together a documentary on Harry Crighton who was a former mayor of Conroe and who founded the Crighton Theatre. The documentary on Harry Crighton is now shown during tours of the theatre.

Wanting to expand what they could offer visitors to the theatre, the two began work on a Bonnie & Clyde documentary.

Wong said Hollyday, a young homeschool student, has a passion for history.

He began a project researching Bonnie and Clyde and they will present some of his findings.

And surprisingly enough, the pair had ties to Montgomery County.

Both Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow are Texas natives having been born in the Dallas area. The two also met in Dallas.

From early 1932 until their deaths in May 1934, the two and their gang went on a crime spree in the central states.

Wong said their style, their sense of independence and their anti-hero status may be some reasons their story remains popular.

"At the end of the day, people like a good story," Wong said.

Accounts in The Courier and stories passed down from generation to generation, also place them in Montgomery County at times.

It has been said that Barrow had relatives in the Conroe area and they'd meet up under the Old San Jacinto River bridge on FM 2854.

"The first time I heard this was from Chuck Stevenson who lived in McDade Estates," said Larry Foerster, chairman of the Montgomery County Historical Commission, in a previous Courier article. "His dad was a deputy in the 1930s and his dad told him the story on more than one occasion of Bonnie and Clyde's visits."

Foerster was told the story again, from another longtime resident whose dad was a sheriff's deputy.

"I've heard this story from two people who in my view were very credible individuals," Foerster said.

It's Foerster's belief that the local law enforcement didn't have any trouble with the gang for two reasons.

The first being that the Bonnie and Clyde gang was so well armed, much more than the local deputies at the time.

The second reason Foerster said has to do with the Barrow family of Conroe being law-abiding citizens and Clyde didn't want to do anything that would hurt the reputation of his Conroe family.

The couple was eventually ambushed and killed by law enforcement in Louisiana on May 23, 1934.